Nightmares
by Eleneri
Summary: Set during Mass Effect 3, in the Rose Athena Shepard storyline. Lieutenant James Vega is having some trouble sleeping. Warning: past abuse mentioned. All characters belong to Bioware/EA. UPDATED with Chapter Two.
1. Chapter 1

Sometimes, in the middle of the Normandy's nightcycle as the ship races time and light to another life or death errand, James dreams of going home.

Tonight there are scorched craters in the sand where he used to play, and the little house on the beach is nothing more than matchsticks that once dreamed of being a structure. Debris is scattered in a wide field, maybe from a Reaper strike, maybe from Alliance fire as they tried to hold off the neverending waves of enemy forces.

In his dreams, James wanders through the scraps of his childhood, idly kicking aside bits of wood and fabric and melted electronics. He's never sure what he's looking for. Photos? Pop never kept any. Pop?

Well... the Reapers never left corpses.

Just as well. It wasn't like he ever wanted to see that asshole's face again.

He's still standing in the wreck of his old porch when the hair on the back of his neck prickles. Shambling steps. He knows that sound, hears it in his nightmares, the ones he doesn't need to admit that he has because they all have them.

The husk is on a slow approach, coming across the beach. The sun is setting behind it, making it harder for James to see any detail. He doesn't need more than a thought before his sidearm is in his hand, charged and ready. A second thought, not even, and he brings the Carnifex to bear on the husk.

Fading, orange light gleams on the stray, incongruously blond bits of hair that still cling in a few long hanks to the husk's pallid scalp. The glowing eyes gleam a murderous blue.

James Vega, veteran of Fehl Prime and Vancouver and a hundred battles no one's bothered to name yet, freezes.

"Pop?"

It's a dream, he knows it's a dream, a damned dream, but fuck if the husk doesn't smell real - mummified flesh and dusty, hot electronics and something uniquely oily and foul, like low tide in a garbage dump. It sounds the same, it moves the same and it opens its tongueless mouth to moan...

Except that it doesn't.

The fucker talks.

"Miss me, boy?"

It's ten feet away, he's let it get that close ; James can't believe he let it get that close. He knows what a husk can do in melee and he's just got this fucking Carnifex and no damn armor.

"I said... miss me,_ boy_?"

His father's voice booms out of the husk's lipless mouth, as clear as it was the day James left. It makes him want to wither, to crumble, but James Vega is a soldier now, a survivor. He's not a child anymore.

_ Blink._

The Carnifex steadies.

_ Blink._

Safety off.

_Blink._

Pull the trigger.

The Carnifex whines. No heat sinks.

_Fuck._

"Useless. Just like you." The husk laughs in his face, all rotten breath and dust, and clings to him. "Never be strong enough, boy. You'll never be strong enough to stand up to me."

Snarling, cursing his lack of armor and any weapon besides himself, James drives his free fist into the thing's face, rocking its head back to an unnatural angle.

"Don't you raise your hand to me, _boy_!" The husk balloons, warping itself into something huge and dark and twisted. The only things James can see clearly are the murderous eyes and the lank blond hair as it blocks out the fading sun. "You need another lesson, _Jimmy_? Just like her?"

The first blow knocks James back. The second lays him out. The third comes straight for his face, knuckles glowing with blue cybernetics and painted with his blood, just like old times, and he knows that this will be the beating he'd always been half-waiting for. The last one.

* * *

James Vega wakes. He's not screaming. He's not. He. Is. _Not_.

He scrubs a shaking hand across his face, feeling scars and stubble and cold sweat. It takes him a long time, longer than he wants to think about, to get his breath under control again. To stop shuddering.

But he does, because he is a fucking _marine_, and if he knows nothing else, he knows that.

As soon as he can, as quietly as he can, James slips out of his bunk. Nothing he can do about the hiss of the door hydraulics opening, but if anyone else wakes to see him leave, they don't say anything.

James doesn't look back as he catfoots his way out the door and to the elevator. He's not scheduled for a combat drop tomorrow, and that's a good thing, because he won't be sleeping anymore tonight. Tonight it's going to be him and his weights and his punching bag until he can't stand, until he's bleeding and every muscle is screaming.

Maybe then he'll sleep, and not dream, and then wake up, go on duty, then train again. And again. And again.

Until he's strong enough.


	2. Chapter 2

_**SSV Normandy-SR2**_

_**Cargo Bay**_

_**0400 Ship Time**_

The flanged turian voice echoed through the cargo bay. "Vega. How long have you been down here?"

James paused, panting, and absently caught his punching bag on the backswing before it slammed into him. "Oh, hey, Scars. Uh, not long."

Garrus tilted his head in a surprisingly human gesture. "Not long, or not long enough."

The marine had to chuckle. It was a low, rough sound, more rust than amusement in it. He stroked one hand down the slick plastene material of the bag, absently noting the blood that was splotching the ragged surface of the tape he'd wound around his knuckles. "Ah, you got me. Not long enough."

Garrus crossed his arms over his chest, and James had the fleeting thought of how odd it was to see him in civvies. Well, he supposed even Archangel didn't sleep in full armor. Not at the moment, anyway.

"You know..." Garrus drawled, "you remind me of someone."

"Yeah?" Figuring the turian wouldn't mind much and needing the movement to shake off the cloying remains of his nightmare, James turned his attention back to the bag. His powerful, bare-knuckle punches left satisfying indentations in the material. "Who?"

Garrus stalked closer with that peculiar gliding step all turians had, until he was inside James' workout area. "Crazy human I served with once. Dark eyes, dark fringe... er, hair. Whatever it is you call it. Heh. Great shot."

James shot a sly grin over his shoulder. "The commander know you daydream about her, Scars?"

It was Garrus' turn to chuckle. "Not Shepard. A turian can dream, I suppose, but Shepard was never for me, and I always knew it. No, this particular human was Gunnery Chief Ashley Madeline Williams."

"I remember hearing about her." James took one final swing at the bag. His fist landed with a very satisfying thud, the impact singing up his arm and into his shoulder. "More than once. Helluva soldier. Only human ever honored by the Salarians and Turians with their highest decorations."

Garrus hummed, a sliding, multitoned sound that held oceans of undercurrent. "She deserved them, and more. Ash was a helluva soldier. She brought honor to her family and her people, and she never once gave an inch of ground, no matter what."

James quirked one scarred brow as he steadied the bag again, the pain in his knuckles drowned out by curiosity. "You admired her a lot?"

The turian laughed outright at the question. "Spirits, no. At first, we hated each other's guts." He tilted his head, clearly thinking. "Well, maybe hated was too strong a word. But she had an Alliance rulebook where her spine was and about two lifetimes' worth of mistrusting my species, and I had the classic turian stick up my ass, so... let's just say that we mutually distrusted each other for a while."

"Sounds fun. I think." James rolled his shoulders, trying to loosen muscles tightened more by nightmares than his workout.

"Well, it did make our duty stations in the cargo bay rather tense for a while." Garrus sat down on a handy supply crate. "We were very careful about not looking at each other for about three days. But... turns out a mutual love of things have triggers and go boom can be the perfect icebreaker."

James wiped the sweat off his face with the towel he'd laid out on his weight bench hours ago. All his lifting and sparring hadn't quite erased the nightmare of his father as a husk, but it had at least managed to smooth out the worst of the nerves. "Sounds like a match made in heaven. What happened once you guys stopped giving each other the stinkeye?"

"What always happens on the _Normandy_. We became family. Not a biological family. Spirits know I've had my share of problems on that front, but... real family." Garrus shook his head, his scarred mandible twitching in what James had come to recognize as a turian sign of bewilderment. "Y'know, I don't know what it is about this ship, if she has excellent unit cohesion built into her design, or if it's something about Shepard, or both. But it's my experience that, if you serve on the _Normandy_, eventually your bitterest enemy becomes your brother." He chuckled, his subvocals slightly louder than normal and rippling with true amusement. "Look what happened to me and Wrex. A turian and a krogan on the same crew? Becoming friends? Fighting at a human's back? The spirits have a sense of humor, James. Trust me on this."

James hesitated. Maybe this was too personal to ask but... "Hey. Uh... Do you miss her? The chief?"

For a moment, just a moment, Garrus lowered his head and his shoulders bowed, as if he were carrying a weight far too heavy for one man. "Every damned day, James," he admitted quietly. "Every damned day." Then he stood again and it was the Garrus Vakarian James was used to seeing eyeing the abused punching bag. "Of course, if she were here, you'd likely have competition for use of that bag. Ash never did suffer fools, and we've had to suffer more than our share lately."

The lieutenant shrugged. "Everybody's gotta find their way to cope, Scars."

"Yeah. They do. But on the _Normandy_, they don't have to do it alone." Garrus flared his mandibles in a small but genuine smile. "Room for one more?"

"Yeah." James found himself relaxing for the first time since he'd woken from his nightmare and stepped back to give his friend room. "Yeah, there's always room for you, brother."


End file.
